The Life of WILLIAM CASEY, a Robber
William Casey, whose life is the subject of our present discourse, was a son of one of the same name, a soldier who had served his Majesty long, and with good reputation. As is usual amongst that sort of people, the education he gave his son was such as might fit him for the same course of life, though at the same time he took care to provide him with a tolerable competency of learning, that is, as to writing and reading English. When he was about fifteen years of age, his father caused him to be enlisted in the same company in which he served for some small time before my Lord Cobham's expedition into Spain,[[12]] in which he accompanied him. That expedition being over, Casey returned into England, and did duty as usual in the Guards.
One night he, with some others, crossing the park a fray happened between them and one John Stone, which as Casey affirmed at his death, was occasioned by the prosecutor Stone offering very great indecencies to him, upon which they in a fury beat and abused him, from the abhorrence they pretended to have for that beastly and unnatural sin of sodomy. Whether this was really the case or no is hard to determine; all who were concerned in it with Casey being indicted (though not apprehended) with him, and their evidence consequently taken. However that matter was, Stone the prosecutor told a dreadful story on Casey's trial. He said the four men attacked him crossing the Park, who attacked, beat and cruelly trod upon and wounded him, taking from him at the same time his hat, wig, neck-cloth and five shillings in money; and that upon his arising and endeavouring to follow them, they turned back, stamped upon him, broke one of his ribs, and told him that if he attempted to stir, they would seize him and swear sodomy upon him. On this indictment Casey was convicted and ordered for execution, notwithstanding all the intercession his friends could make.
While under sentence he complained heavily of the pains a certain corporal had taken in preparing and pressing the evidence against him. He said his diligence proceeded not from any desire of doing justice, or for his guilt, but from an old grudge he owed their family, from Casey's father threatening to prosecute him for a rape committed on his daughter, then very young, and attended with very cruel circumstances; and which even the corporal himself had in part owned in a letter which he had written to the said Casey's father. However, while he lay in Newgate, he seemed heartily affected with sorrow for his misspent life, which he said was consumed as is too frequent among soldiers, either in idleness or vice. He added, that in Spain he had made serious resolutions of amendment with himself, but was hindered from performing them by his companions, who were continually seducing him into his old courses. When he found that all hopes of life were lost, he disposed himself to submit with decency to his fate, which disposition he preserved to the last.
At the place of execution he behaved with great composure and said that as he had heard he was accused in the world of having robbed and murdered a woman in Hyde Park, he judged it proper to discharge his conscience by declaring that he knew nothing of the murder, but said nothing as to the robbery. At the time of his death, which was on the 11th of September, 1721, he was about twenty years of age, and according to the character his officers gave him, a very quiet and orderly young man. He left behind him a paper to be published to the world, which as he was a dying man he averred to be the truth.
A copy of a paper left by William Casey.
Good People, I am now brought to this place to suffer a shameful and ignominious death, and of all such unhappy persons, 'tis expected by the world that they should either say something at their death, or leave some account behind them. And having that which more nearly concerns me, viz., the care of my immortal soul, I choose rather to leave these lines behind me than to waste my few precious moments in talking to the multitude. First, I declare, I die like a member, though a very unworthy one, of the Church of England as by Law established, the principles of which my now unhappy father took an early care to instruct me in. And next for the robbery of Mr. Stone, for which I am now brought to this fatal place. I solemnly do declare to God and the world, that I never had the value of one halfpenny from him, and that the occasion of his being so ill-used was that he offered to me that detestable and crying sin of sodomy.
I take this opportunity, with almost my last breath, to give my hearty thanks to the honourable Col. Pitts, and Col. Pagitt, for their endeavours to save my life, and indeed I had some small hopes that his Majesty, in consideration of the services of my whole family, having all been faithful soldiers and servants to the Crown of England, would have extended one branch of his mercy to me, and have sent me to have served him in another country. But welcome be the Grace of God, I am resigned to His will, and die in charity with all men, forgiving, hoping to be forgiven myself, through the merits of my blessed Saviour Jesus Christ. I hope, and make it my earnest request that nobody will be so little Christian as to reflect on my aged parents, wife, brother, or sisters, for my untimely end. And I pray God, into whose hands I commend my spirit, that the great number of sodomites in and about this City and suburbs, may not bring down the same judgement from Heaven as fell on Sodom and Gomorrah.
William Casey.
Sir Richard Temple, 1st Viscount Cobham, was a distinguished general who had served under Marlborough. In 1719 he led an expedition to the north coast of Spain and seized Vigo and the neighbouring towns and harbours.
The Life of JOHN DYKES, a Thief and Highwayman
It is a reflection almost too common to be repeated that of all the vices to which young people are addicted, nothing is so dangerous as a habit and inclination to gaming. To explain this would be to swell a volume. Instances which are so numerous do it much better. Perhaps this unhappy person John Dykes is as strong a one as is anywhere to be met with. His parents were persons in middling circumstances, but he being their eldest child, they treated him with great indulgence, and to the detriment of their own fortune afforded him a necessary education. When he grew up and his friends thought of placing him out apprentice, he always found some excuse or other to avoid it, which arose only from his great indolence of temper, and his continual itching after gaming. When he had money, he went to the gaming tables about town, and when reduced by losses sustained there, would put on an old ragged coat and get out to play at chuck, and span-farthing, amongst the boys in the street, by which, sometimes he got money enough to go to his old companions again. But this being a very uncertain recourse, he made use more frequently of picking pockets; for which being several times apprehended and committed to Bridewell, his friends, especially his poor father, would often demonstrate to him the ignominious end which such practices would necessarily bring on, entreating him while there was yet time, to reflect and to leave them off, promising to do their utmost for him, notwithstanding all that was past. In the course of this unhappy life the youth had acquired an extraordinary share of cunning, and an unusual capacity of dissembling; he employed it more than once to deceive his family into a belief of his having made a thorough resolution of amendment.
Once, after having suffered the usual discipline of the horsepond, Dykes was carried before a Justice of Peace, and committed to Tothill Fields Bridewell[[13]]. Here he became acquainted with one Jeddediah West, a Quaker's son, who had fallen into the like practices, and for them shared the same punishment with himself. They were pretty much of a temper, but Jeddediah was the elder and much the more subtle of the two, and in this unhappy place they contracted a strict and intimate friendship. Out of shame Jeddediah forbore for two or three days to acquaint his relations, and during that time for the most part subsisted out of what Dykes got from home. But at last West picked up courage enough to send to his brother, a very eminent man in business, and by telling him a plausible story, procured not only pity and relief, but even prevailed on him to believe that he was innocent of the fact for which he was committed. He so well tutored his friend Dykes that though he could not persuade his parents into the same degree of credulity, yet his outward appearance of penitence induced them not only to pardon him but to take him home, give him a new suit of clothes, and to promise him, if he continued to do well, whatever was in their power to do for him.
Dykes and his companion being in favour with their friends, and having money in their pockets, continued their correspondence and went often to the gaming tables together. At first they had a considerable run of luck for about three weeks, but Fortune then forsaking them, they were reduced to be downright penniless, without any hopes of relief or assistance from their friends sufficient to carry on their expenses. West at last proposed an expedient for raising money, which lay altogether upon himself, and which he the next day executed in the following manner.
About the time that he knew his brother was to come home from the Exchange to dinner, he went to his house equipped in a sailor's pea-jacket, his hair cropped short to his ears, his eyebrows coloured black, and a handkerchief about his neck. As soon as he saw him in the counting-house, his brother started back, and cried, Bless me! Jeddediah, how came you in this pickle? With all signs of grief and confusion, he threw himself at his brother's feet, and told him with a flood of tears that two coiners who had accidentally seen him in Bridewell had sworn against him and three others on their apprehension, in order on the merit thereof to be admitted evidences to get off themselves. So that, dear brother, he continued, I have been obliged to take a passage in a vessel that does down next tide to Gravesend, for I have ran the hazard of my life to come and beg your charitable assistance.
The poor honest man was so much amazed and concerned at this melancholy tale, that bursting out into tears, and hanging about his brother's neck, he begged him to take a coach and begone to Billingsgate, giving him ten guineas in hand and telling him that his bills should not be protested if he drew within the compass of a hundred pounds from Dieppe, whither he said the ship was bound. West was no sooner out of the street where his brother lived, but he ordered the coach to drive to a certain place where he had appointed Dykes to meet him, and there they expressed a great deal of mutual satisfaction at the trick West had played his brother. However, the latter was no great gainer in the end, for Mr. West, senior, soon finding out the contrivance, forever renounced him, and Jeddediah being soon after arrested for twelve pounds due to his tailor, was carried to prison and remained there without the least assistance from his brother, till after his friend Dykes was hanged.
The last mentioned malefactor, unmoved by all the tender entreaties of his friends, and the glaring prospect before him of his own ruin, went still on at the old rate, and whenever gaming had brought him low in cash, took up with the road, or some such like dishonest method to recruit it. At last he had the ill-luck to commit a robbery in Stepney parish, in the road between Mile End and Bow, upon one Charles Wright, to whose bosom clapping a pistol, he commanded him to deliver peacefully, or he would shoot him through the body. The booty he took was very inconsiderable, being only a penknife, an ordinary seal, and five shillings and eightpence in money. A poor price for life, since two days after he was apprehended for this robbery, committed to Newgate and condemned the next sessions.
His behaviour under these unhappy circumstances was very mean, and such as fully showed what difference there is between courage and that resolution which is necessary to support the spirits and calm our apprehensions at the certain approach of a violent death. I forbear attempting any description of those unutterable torments which the exterior marks of a distracted behaviour fully showed that this poor wretch endured. And as I have nothing more to add of him, but that he confessed his having been guilty of a multitude of ill acts, he submitted at last with greater cheerfulness than he had ever shown during his confinement to that shameful death which the Law had ordained for his crimes, on the 23rd of October, 1721, when he was about twenty-three years of age.
This Bridewell occupied the site adjoining the north side of the Green Coat School, on the west: side of Artillery Place. Although originally intended for vagrants, early in the 18th century it was turned into a house of detention for criminals.